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A Dream of Freedom
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From: Robin Smith <robinsmith59>
Date: Mon, 20 Dec 2004 09:38:33 -0600
from Dean Schneider:
Not to speak for NIna Lindsay, but her point is documentation. When a strong statement is made in a text -- such as McWhorter's on black people beginning to believe in "the inferiority inflicted on them" (16) or that "they began to accept a form of social insanity as reasonable" (15) -- readers ought to be able to see where such conclusions came from, who said it, who was interviewed, or whose work was consulted. These are striking statements; it's not enough to go to the back of the book and see a big Selected Bibliography and Suggestions for Further Reading. And it's not enough to say that our own experience or other speakers or other writers confirm McWhorter's conclusions; the documentation of the text itself ought to confirm her conclusions.
So, I agree with the problems in documentation. On the other hand, I also agree with Roger Sutton in the new issue of Horn Book (Jan/Feb): "Written with passion, intelligence, and respect for young readers, this history of the civil rights movement has everything -- except source notes and a decent bibliography." He goes on to acknowledge that this is "more than a niggling, by-the-way criticism," but nevertheless he finds the book good enough to give a starred review.
I probably would not have starred it, given the flaws, but I'm a seventh- and eighth-grade English teacher, and I can see using it in the classroom as a fine complement to some of the novels I teach, such as Mildred Taylor's The Road to Memphis. Taylor's novels are such good expressions of why there had to be a civil rights movement, and McWhorter's work is an excellent study of that movement from 195468. For adult readers of history, I recommend John Egerton's Speak Now Against the Day, a big study of civil rights work prior to the 1950s. He demonstrates how the Civil Rights movement did not spring to full life in 1954; there had been much work before then, by black and white people, which makes me wonder about McWhorter's conclusion that black people believed in the inferiority inflicted upon them or accepted "social insanity" as reasonable.
I, too, have liked Russell Freedman's The Voice that Challenged America. It says so much about civil rights through the lens of one great person, and the documentation is thorough and interesting.
Dean Schneider Ensworth School Nashville, Tennessee
Received on Mon 20 Dec 2004 09:38:33 AM CST
Date: Mon, 20 Dec 2004 09:38:33 -0600
from Dean Schneider:
Not to speak for NIna Lindsay, but her point is documentation. When a strong statement is made in a text -- such as McWhorter's on black people beginning to believe in "the inferiority inflicted on them" (16) or that "they began to accept a form of social insanity as reasonable" (15) -- readers ought to be able to see where such conclusions came from, who said it, who was interviewed, or whose work was consulted. These are striking statements; it's not enough to go to the back of the book and see a big Selected Bibliography and Suggestions for Further Reading. And it's not enough to say that our own experience or other speakers or other writers confirm McWhorter's conclusions; the documentation of the text itself ought to confirm her conclusions.
So, I agree with the problems in documentation. On the other hand, I also agree with Roger Sutton in the new issue of Horn Book (Jan/Feb): "Written with passion, intelligence, and respect for young readers, this history of the civil rights movement has everything -- except source notes and a decent bibliography." He goes on to acknowledge that this is "more than a niggling, by-the-way criticism," but nevertheless he finds the book good enough to give a starred review.
I probably would not have starred it, given the flaws, but I'm a seventh- and eighth-grade English teacher, and I can see using it in the classroom as a fine complement to some of the novels I teach, such as Mildred Taylor's The Road to Memphis. Taylor's novels are such good expressions of why there had to be a civil rights movement, and McWhorter's work is an excellent study of that movement from 195468. For adult readers of history, I recommend John Egerton's Speak Now Against the Day, a big study of civil rights work prior to the 1950s. He demonstrates how the Civil Rights movement did not spring to full life in 1954; there had been much work before then, by black and white people, which makes me wonder about McWhorter's conclusion that black people believed in the inferiority inflicted upon them or accepted "social insanity" as reasonable.
I, too, have liked Russell Freedman's The Voice that Challenged America. It says so much about civil rights through the lens of one great person, and the documentation is thorough and interesting.
Dean Schneider Ensworth School Nashville, Tennessee
Received on Mon 20 Dec 2004 09:38:33 AM CST
